“The master retired, intending to leave him till morning, but we were awakened in the night by the groans of the negro, which were so doleful that we feared he was dying.  We went to him, and found him covered with a cold sweat, and almost gone.  He could not have lived an hour longer.  Mr. ——­ found the ‘stocks’ such an effective punishment, that it almost superseded the whip.”

“How much do you give your niggers for a task while hoeing cotton,” inquired Mr. C——­ of his neighbor Mr. H——.”

H.  “I give my men an acre and a quarter, and my women an acre."[15]

[Footnote 15:  Cotton is planted in drills about three feet apart, and is hilled like corn.]

C.  “Well, that is a fair task.  Niggers do a heap better if they are drove pretty tight.”

H.  “O yes, I have driven mine into complete subordination.  When I first bought them they were discontented and wished me to sell them, but I soon whipped that out of them; and they now work very contentedly!”

C.  “Does Mary keep up with the rest?”

H.  “No, she does’nt often finish the task alone, she has to get Sam to help her out after he has done his, to save her a whipping.  There’s no other way but to be severe with them.”

C.  “No other, sir, if you favor a nigger you spoil him.”

“The whip is considered as necessary on a plantation as the plough; and its use is almost as common.  The negro whip is the common teamster’s whip with a black leather stock, and a short, fine, knotted lash.  The paddle is also frequently used, sometimes with holes bored in the flattened end.  The ladies (!) in chastising their domestic servants, generally use the cowhide.  I have known some use shovel and tongs.  It is, however, more common to commit them to the driver to be whipped.  The manner of whipping is as follows:  The negro is tied by his hands, and sometimes feet, to a post or tree, and stripped to the skin.  The female slave is not always tied.  The number of lashes depends upon the character for severity of the master or overseer.

“Another instrument of torture is sometimes used, how extensively I know not.  The negro, or, in the case which came to my knowledge, the negress was compelled to stand barefoot upon a block filled with sharp pegs and nails for two or three hours.  In case of sickness, if the master or overseer thinks them seriously ill, they are taken care of, but their complaints are usually not much heeded.  A physician told me that he was employed by a planter last winter to go to a plantation of his in the country, as many of the negroes were sick.  Says he—­“I found them in a most miserable condition.  The weather was cold, and the negroes were barefoot, with hardly enough of cotton clothing to cover their nakedness.  Those who had huts to shelter them were obliged to build them nights and Sundays.  Many were sick and some had died.  I had the sick